These good Effects are owing to that penetrating, strong _Salt_, with which the Substance of these Creatures does, in a very great Proportion, abound; and the Reason of _this_ is from the Food they live on, which we have observ’d before to be Lizzards, Moles, _&c._ whose Nature every one knows to be such as must necessarily, when they are dissolv’d in the Stomach, supply the Blood with a great Quantity of Active and Volatile Parts. And herein lies the Difference between the Flesh of Vipers, and _that_ of other Innocent Serpents, which feeding upon Grass, Herbs, _&c._ do not recommend themselves to us by any of those Properties which are in so Eminent a Degree found in the former. Whosoever reflects on what has been said on this Head, will very readily Acknowledge, That our Physicians deal too Cautiously or Sparingly with a Remedy which may be apply’d to very good Purposes, when they prescribe a few Grains of the _Pouder_ of dried Vipers, or make up a small Quantity of their Flesh into _Troches_; whereas, if Service be really to be done this Way, the Patient ought to eat frequently of Viper-Gelly, or Broth; or rather, as the ancient manner was, to boil Vipers, and eat them like Fish; if this Food will not go down, (tho’ really very Good and Delicious Fare) to make use at least of Wine, in which Vipers have for a long time been infused, by which I know a very obstinate _Lepra_ has been removed; or lastly, in some Cases, especially where Wine is not Convenient, to take good Quantities of their _Volatile Salt_, in which alone the Virtue of the before-named Medicines does principally reside. [Illustration] An APPENDIX to the Foregoing Essay; Containing _Some Anatomical Observations on the VIPER, and an Account of some other_ Venomous Animals. In repeated Dissections of the _Viper_, comparing the _Descriptions_ given Us by Authors with the _Parts_ themselves, I have found them in many Particulars to be very Defective. I shall however at present confine my self to some Observations made chiefly on those Organs which serve to prepare and emit the _Poison_. To begin therefore with the Head. The _Skull_ (_Fig. 2._) is composed of several Bones, joined together by _Sutures_, as in _Man_, but with this Difference, that the _Os Frontis_ in the Viper consists of Two Bones united by a Rectilinear _Suture_, and the _Parietal_ Bones are entire; whereas in Man the _Parietal_ Bones have _Sutures_, and the _Os Frontis_ is entire. (_a_) Shews Two small Semicircular Bones, which form the inferior Part of the _Nostrils_. (_b_) The Two Bones which make the upper Part of the _Nose_, from the latter pass down two thin _Laminæ_, which touching one another, and falling perpendicular upon the _Ossa Palati_, compose the _Septum_ of the Nose. (_e e_) Point out the _Ossa Frontis_, which form the upper Part of the _Orbits_ of the Eyes. And (_c c_) the _Orbits_ themselves.